Calvin desperate?

[johnnyseychelles]

Watch the race again and try to imagine a circle the field win.  Guess i\'m just not that creative or have a need to understand the \"why\".  Tons the best?  I figure Pioneer of the Nile wins if you take the overland route.  But maybe you\'re right and i just don\'t get Geometry!

[miff]

John,

Geometry is for Kool Aid drinkers as it applies to the totality of the particular dynamics of a race.


Mike

[TGJB]

Uh-huh. And for those of us who do believe in geometry, MTB got a little better figure, but if you flip the trips Pioneer wins the race. Probably a coincidence that in all 3 wins by Borel and all 3 by Cordero they were 1w1w (one coming from last in a 24 horse field).

[TGJB]

Dana--

1-- the Southern California jocket colony has been weak overall for years, Gomez is the only one recently who is really a top rider, though Talamo is close. Hardly anybody even tries to come through inside.

2-- AGAIN-- you are completely disregarding the fact that Borel was 1w both turns in all three wins (as well as with Street Sense in the BC Juvenile). If he only did it once, or had won a couple with wide trips, it would be a different story, and you could say it was luck. Sure, the horse matters, and there is a ton of randomness involved. That\'s why the trip and that it happened three times matters.

[miff]

Double uh-huh, no horse ever won any race SOLELY because he was 1w 1w, he also had to have enough run to take advantage of that trip.

[Rick B.]

Dana666 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I am saying there may well be a great deal of luck or
> randomness or whatever else you want to call it
> that is indeed responsible for his recent success
> in the derby, and people might well be making way
> too much of his skills esp. in comparison to the
> other riders --exactly! That\'s my only point here.

It\'s a desperately flawed point, Dana. Seriously -- you are the ONLY person I\'ve ever heard, anywhere, insist that Borel\'s Derby success has anything to do with luck or randomness. You have several esteemed posters here (no, I don\'t count myself in this group) trying to tell you oh so kindly, that you are simply wrong about this. Yet, you persist, and I have no idea...

Wait a minute. Dana? You sneak! I\'m back to thinking that you ARE pulling our legs: even my ex-wife -- the most miserable, stubborn cur on the planet, according to Guinness -- would back down after a half-dozen people (other than me, of course) told her she was wrong. So this HAS to be a tardy April Fool\'s Day gag.

I salute you! You got me, good. My gullibility is on display for all to see.

[Dana666]

Well, I\'m glad I amuse you! What do I care if people agree? That, a couple bucks, and a metro card gets me a ride on the subway! I\'m usually better off in most things (racing included) if everyone disagrees with me.

Why should I back down? I\'m just making an observation.

The mere fact that so many people reacted so strongly tells me I\'m hitting upon some valid point. People usually react more calmly if they disagree with an idiot b/c they figure, hey, you can\'t argue with an idiot, but they seem like I insulted their family or something here and that really tells me something.

It is a little painful sometimes to acknowledge that so many of our successes are due in very little measure to our talents and abilities and often more a question of luck or being in the right place at the right time.

Our entire society puts way too much faith in the credibility of experts or successful people than they should. I think Trump is basically a celebrity and nothing more, yet some people say he would make a great president. What can I say, they are assuming he is something special, and that\'s why he\'s wealthy or whatever-- same with Bill gates, you really think he was so much smarter than all those other geeks? But Microsoft became the gold standard.

We like winners and give them magical attributes. We read their books about success! They might not be any smarter than the homeless guy at the train station--if not for the grace of God kind of thing.

I never said Borel wasn\'t a good rider. I just said he\'s not that much better than all those other guys. I did say he was able to take advantage of the luck or randomness and that carries some weight for sure.

I\'m kind of bored with this topic, so I\'ll let you all have the last words. I agree with Jerry, the California colony hasn\'t been as strong in recent years, but I was thinking of the last 50 years or so. In the 70\'s, for example, if you were the man, you eventually tried California, you had to, that was the real proving ground for the best of the best.

[JimP]

Dana, I know it\'s not worth much but I understood your point about the role of randomness in these matters and how it might be related to Borel\'s recent Derby results. I think you stated your case very well and I appreciated your contribution to the subject. But you\'re not likely to ever win this particular argument on this particular board.

[Dana666]

I found that out! LOL

[ajkreider]

The blimp shot of the ride on Dennis of Cork was really a thing of beauty.

[albany]

Luck is the residue of design.

Simply stated, Calvin put himself in a position to be lucky while others failed to do so.

[moosepalm]

Dana, I believe most discussions of randomness teeter on a slippery slope, particularly in a game where the notion of \"luck,\" real or imagined, lurks around every corner.  At what point is there a pure sense of randomness in a race that is not influenced in the least by some conscious prior determination of trainer, jockey, etc.?  There\'s randomness to the picking of balls, or whatever they do, to set up the order of post position selection.  Beyond that, it\'s not clear to me.  I can only look at a cluster of events, suggestive of individual choice, skill, etc., and hypothesize that something produced a result that appears to defy pure randomness.  For me, Calvin Borel\'s performance in the past four derbies strongly suggests that he is either the luckiest SOB who ever set foot on a race track, or that randomness was augmented by his skill and racing acumen.

Initially you asked, \"I wonder when people will stop talking about him?\"  I think the obvious answer is when he stops winning the most publicized race in the thoroughbred game.  Regardless of your opinion of him, I don\'t know why you would even ask that question.  Even if his accomplishments were pure luck, people would still be talking about him.  You then finished the post by saying \"he might never finish in the money in the Derby the rest of his career.\"  Indeed, but might that not also be random, and if so, why bother talking about anything at all?

[Rich Curtis]

Rick B wrote:

\"It\'s a desperately flawed point, Dana. Seriously -- you are the ONLY person I\'ve ever heard, anywhere, insist that Borel\'s Derby success has anything to do with luck or randomness.\"

You can add MTB\'s trainer. He said after the Derby that it was a super ride, and that \"everything fell together,\" and that \"we were really lucky to get through there.\"

[Rick B.]

Dana666 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The mere fact that so many people reacted so
> strongly tells me I\'m hitting upon some valid
> point. People usually react more calmly if they
> disagree with an idiot b/c they figure, hey, you
> can\'t argue with an idiot, but they seem like I
> insulted their family or something here and that
> really tells me something.

I would draw an equally strong reaction if I came out here and made an equally ridiculous announcement that all TG figs over 20 are slow by 35%, and all TG figs under 10 are fast by 35% -- ESPECIALLY if I didn\'t or couldn\'t provide any proof!
 
> It is a little painful sometimes to acknowledge
> that so many of our successes are due in very
> little measure to our talents and abilities and
> often more a question of luck or being in the
> right place at the right time.
>
> Our entire society puts way too much faith in the
> credibility of experts or successful people than
> they should. I think Trump is basically a
> celebrity and nothing more, yet some people say he
> would make a great president. What can I say, they
> are assuming he is something special, and that\'s
> why he\'s wealthy or whatever-- same with Bill
> gates, you really think he was so much smarter
> than all those other geeks? But Microsoft became
> the gold standard.
>
> We like winners and give them magical attributes.
> We read their books about success! They might not
> be any smarter than the homeless guy at the train
> station--if not for the grace of God kind of
> thing.

This whole passage speaks volumes about you, Dana, and what you believe; it\'s not human effort that moves us forward -- it\'s predetermined...all in the cards...and when your number comes up, you win. It\'s simply not in your control. You are not responsible for being a loser, and you get no credit for any success that comes your way.

This is, in effect, what some early Protestant church Reformers believed, most notably, a 16th century Reformer by the name of...John Calvin. His doctrine and beliefs became known as Calvinism; his followers, Calvinists.

What delicious irony! Dana is a CALVINIST!

[Dana666]

Interesting! I never thought of myself that way. I would say, at the very least, I believe in some degree of co-creation though I\'m not sure what the percentage. Not a Calvinist, but not a new-age guru either--thinking we create our reality entirely or some such stuff like that. I\'d be more of a Taleb-ist in this case. I do think humans completely flawed in almost everything we do, esp. when we try to link cause and effect or invent narratives to explain life.

Taleb might say, perhaps, the random (favorable in this case) black swan isn\'t enough to come your way or Borel\'s way -- we need at least to do two things: take freaking advantage of it (which, of course, your man Borel certainly does well), and the other thing is don\'t take the success too personally.

What I mean by that, not so much for jockeys but more for investors (or gamblers) is don\'t assume you had anything to do with the favorable black swan coming your way--not your skills or brilliant mind or whatever, just some randomness, and, most importantly, if you make a freaky score--afterwards, play it very conservatively for the most part, thinking, if indeed it is a favorable black swan, there may never be another series of events like this in my lifetime, so I shouldn\'t expect this success to follow me for the next twenty years. Don\'t take too much credit for it and let it go to your head, or you will have your own unfavorable black swan in the near future that will most likely wipe you off the face of the earth.

My posts, if they have any relevance at all, are more geared toward the way people look at Borel, rather than the man himself. Has nothing to do with him. If he\'s buying Porsche\'s bad idea, if he\'s playing it cool, saving the cash for a rainy day--good move. That kind of thing.